


twice removed

by presidentbees



Series: Arcane Distillery [4]
Category: Arcane Distillery, Original Work
Genre: Angst with no happy ending, Demon possession, Family Drama, Grief/Mourning, Original Character(s), Original Character-centric, im not sorry, sibling angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-01
Updated: 2019-01-01
Packaged: 2019-10-01 19:44:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,729
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17250236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/presidentbees/pseuds/presidentbees
Summary: "You're lying to me!” He continued, his voice wavering as he struggled to control his emotions. “You think that I don't notice! But I always have! I’ve always known when you were lying to me! Why can’t you just tell the truth! For once!"Andres' smile had disappeared, and her face face was an impassive, unreadable mask. Unfolding her hands, she reached across the table to lightly touch her brother's arm. "Bonnie, I can—""Don't touch me!"





	twice removed

Andres' smile was frozen on her face. Bonnie's comment had caught her so off-guard that all she could do was sit there, dumfounded. "Huh?"

Bonnie sat across from her, his eyes darted around the room, focusing on everything except for Andres. His hands shook slightly as he stirred another creamer into his coffee. He had his phone set up in front of him, and a bluetooth earpiece in one ear. For show, he reached up to touch it, making it look like he was in the middle of a call. 

"When was the last time that you were honest with me?” He repeated. “And I mean actually honest with me. Because I've been thinking and I can't think of anything recent. I had to clean out your apartment and-"

He stopped. Blinking rapidly, Bonnie distracted himself by taking a long sip of his coffee. It was too hot, burning his mouth and throat on the way down, and he could feel Eidolon jeer from the far corner in his mind. The pain helped him focus though — just slightly.

"I had to clean out your apartment, and I learned so much about you. Stuff I didn't know. I didn't know that you needed to dye your hair. Or that you were basically just having rice and hot dogs for every meal."

"Actually, I ate a lot of pizza." Andres butted in before Bonnie could start getting too personal. She tried to keep her words light, playful. "You know I hate cooking. The guys at Mean Slice practically had my number memorized. For everything else — I'm allowed to have some secrets, right?” 

She knew she had more secrets than she wanted shared with Bonnie. Andres probably had more skeletons in her closet than the average person — she needed something more like a designated skeleton room, or maybe a mass grave. 

“We’re both adults,” she continued, “so you don’t need to know everything about me. I’m allowed to have my own life and hobbies.”

"Hobbies.” Bonnie’s voice sounded uncannily similar to Jess’ “I’m not angry, I’m just disappointed” tone, and Andres felt a chill run down her back — oh, she was busted for something. “Hobbies like having a drawer full of credit cards? With other peoples names? What was that about? That's not a hobby!"

Feigning confusion, Andres pretended that she was trying to remember before snapping her fingers in faux-revelation. "Oh! Are you talking about the cards that I had in my nightstand? The ones held together in a rubber band? Bon, those were cards that people left in their old wallets that they donated to the antique store. Those were all duds. I only kept them because I wanted—"

"You're doing it again! You're doing it right now, Bethany!" Bonnie's voice kicked up an octave. His eyes took on a slight sheen as angry tears began to form.

The people sitting nearby cast wary glances over at Bonnie — not really caring enough to intervene, but still uncomfortable with the noise. 

"You're lying to me!” He continued, his voice wavering as he struggled to control his emotions. “You think that I don't notice! But I always have! I’ve always known when you were lying to me! Why can’t you just tell the truth! For once!"

"Bon, hey. You've got to quiet down. You're drawing attention." Andres said as she tried to smile reassuringly. “Listen, we're in a nice place, and there's people around. You don't want them to kick you out, so you need to lower your voice, alright? The cards aren’t that important.”

Bonnie's face was beginning to turn a particular shade of scarlet as a flush crept up from his neck, all the way to the tips of his ears. "It’s not even about the cards! It’s everything about how you— you—"

He struggled to find the words to describe what he was feeling — something like betrayal mixing with the lingering ache sorrow. He had so many things that he had wanted to say to Andres before. At her funeral, he had stood over her casket and looked at her face and wished that he could have a chance to talk to her again. He didn't realize how many things he wanted to say until she was gone and—

—and now she was here. Sitting across from him and wearing that sympathetic smile that was just patronizing enough that Bonnie was starting to feel stupid and doubting the reasons why he was angry. It was a smile that told Bonnie he was being irrational — he didn’t need to be this angry. The woman sitting across from him looked exactly like Bethany in every single way, but Bonnie kept getting the creeping feeling that he was looking at something else. 

Maybe it was Eidolon planting the subconscious thought in his mind, but he couldn't look at her without thinking of his sister's lifeless face as she laid in her casket. Seeing her now was like looking at a doppelganger — or something alien wear her skin.

Bonnie's anger was the same though. Even if this wasn’t actually his sister, he had been bottling these frustrations up for a long time, and they needed to be said. 

"You were never honest with me when you were alive! And now you're not _not_ -alive. But you're still not being honest with me! I feel like I don't know you! I don't know who you were! And I don't know who you're supposed to be now!" Bonnie felt his voice crack on the last word. 

Andres' smile had disappeared, and her face face was an impassive, unreadable mask. Unfolding her hands, she reached across the table to lightly touch her brother's arm. "Bonnie, I can—"

"Don't touch me!" the chair screeched loudly as Bonnie violently flinched back. His coffee tipped over, spilling scalding liquid over the table and onto Bonnie’s clothing.

Standing up quickly, Bonnie swiped his phone from the table and looked around. People were beginning to get up from their own tables, shooting dirty looks as they walked away. One person went to the counter and began talking to the manager, gesturing back toward Bonnie — he saw the manager look over at him, narrowing her eyes suspiciously. 

Bonnie felt himself go cold.There were— there were so many people looking at him. All of a sudden, he was very aware that everybody had watched as he sat alone, yelling at empty air. And now he was standing with coffee on his jeans. And not doing anything. 

He needed to leave. 

Grabbing his laptop bag from the floor, Bonnie fled. He could feel Eidolon beginning to pick up in the back of his mind — looping the silent image of a laughing cartoon character as it fed off of Bonnie’s misery. Its message was clear: Bonnie was a joke, and he had proven it in front of everybody in that cafe. _what a disgrace. he should just—_

The door’s bells tinkled merrily as Bonnie wrenched the cafe’s door open, stepping out into the busy city and letting the cacophonous noise drown out his thoughts. 

Saint Andres still sat frozen, a look of bewilderment on her face. Her silver hand still held out toward Bonnie in a gesture that she thought was going to be comforting. She didn’t understand — that wasn’t how their conversation was supposed to go.

 _‘where did i go wrong? what did i do that was wrong?’_ — St. Andres thoughts tumbled together as she tried to replay what just happened in her mind. Already, it was beginning to fog over, the details becoming more indistinct. _‘was bonnie acting weird, or was i? was that his fault? something must have been wrong with him. i should follow him.’_

St. Andres stood up from the table, right as an employee came up behind her. He phased through her, sending uncomfortable shivers through her body as he tossed a handful of napkins onto the mess of spilled coffee that Bonnie had left behind. 

“Bastard” the employee mumbed. He had pink hair — a bad dye job, St. Andres could see his brown roots coming in — and he tucked a strand of it behind one ear as he began to sop up the mess. "He didn’t even fucking try to clean up.”

“Don't swear if you're on the clock, or else I’ll write you up.” 

St. Andres had time to sidestep as another employee — no, not an employee. this was the manager — walked up with hands on her hips. She handed the employee a rag, and he took it from her sheepishly. 

“Sorry, m’am. Did you, uh, know that guy? Should we call somebody?” 

The manager sighed, looking out the window to watch as Bonnie ran away. “Yeah, I know him. He's a regular for the morning shift, so you wouldn't know him, but he's a nice guy. Normal. I don’t have any idea what that was about.” 

“Forreal? What's his name?” 

Even though there was nobody around to hear it, St. Andres answered anyway — "His name is Bonnie." 

She stood next to the manager, arms folded over her stomach as she watched as her brother ran across the lanes traffic. Car horns blared angrilly, and Bonnie raised one hand in apology as his other hand held his phone up to his ear. He was talking to somebody — _who was he talking to? who else did he have to call?_

St. Andres watched as Bonnie’s aura — less of an ‘aura’ and more of a burning pillar of orange-red light — wavered as he distanced himself from her. Soon, it would be out of sight, and she would have to wait for Bonnie to find her again. 

The bells on the door jingled as St. Andres passed through them, stepping out onto the gray, city street. Buildings were already beginning to melt, dissolving into the soft, monotone colored shapes that St. Andres had learned to accept as landmarks in her new world. Bonnie’s burning pillar had fully disappeared from view, and St. Andres’ world was back to being painted in its drab, colorless palette.

St. Andres sighed. She would bide her time and wait for Bonnie. Patience was one of her greatest virtues. She’d find something else to do in the meantime. St. Andres had nothing but time to kill as she waited for Bonnie to find her for help. 

He’d always relied on her — this didn’t change anything

**Author's Note:**

> I've been on ao3 long enough to know that the only popular thing on here is porn but ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ I still love posting stuff. Even just so I can remember it. this was a major vent piece made during a 48-hour period where I wasn't sleeping due to stress and the only way I could productively vent was writing about sibling angst with my favorite troupe of "one sibling is dead, and one sibling is struggling to accept that fact bc their ghost still lingers"
> 
> If you want to learn more about [Bonnie](https://toyhou.se/1670027.bonnie-daven) and [Andres](https://toyhou.se/1780532.andres), you can read up on their toyhou.se pages! Or you can read more about them over here: Arcane Distillery ([Bonnie](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15693540/chapters/36469335)), Arcane Distillery ([Andres](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15693540/chapters/38697899)).
> 
> Major thank you to catphantoms ([DA](https://www.deviantart.com/catphantoms) // [Twitter](https://twitter.com/bearconspiracy) // [Tumblr](http://memeticmutation.tumblr.com/) // [Art Tumblr](http://catphantoms.tumblr.com/)) for giving me so much praise that I actually cried. I can't thank you enough for all the compliments you've given me through the year about my writing — it's really inspired me to keep writing.


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